Wood’s LA10 Blog

In the time since the burning of books became commonplace, Christianity has been trivialized and reduced to a marketing ploy. Instead of a sacred figure and idol, Jesus Christ of Nazareth is made out to be, as Faber says, “one of the family,” a familiar face who is there to recommend certain products to all Christians (as well as anyone else who may be watching). Religion is a controversial thing; something that has no place in a world where one’s only goal in life should be to be happy and entertained, free of troublesome thought. As Beatty says on page 59, “People want to be happy, isn’t that right?…I want to be happy, people say. Well, aren’t they? Don’t we keep them moving, don’t we give them fun? That’s all we live for, isn’t it? For pleasure, for titillation?…” Religion as it is today would only cause trouble in Bradbury’s world. Faber, a self-proclaimed coward and a scholarly man, did not resist the change because he was scared of being targeted, of being guilty; he chose to stay silent because he had nobody else to protest with him. Now,  he has another chance to rebel; should he? I believe that Montag and Faber should continue to stash books and go through with their idea of planting them in the homes of firemen. Doing this just might bring about a change of heart among the firemen, or at least bring attention to the cause. Hopefully the mindset that books are good, even necessary, will spread to the common people as well. The concept of rounding up fellow scholars and educators and others who could be sympathetic to the cause will bring strength to their movement; there is safety in numbers.